


reflections in crystal

by eva_cybele



Series: flew like a moth to you, sunlight [3]
Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Angst, F/M, Flashbacks, Naked Cuddling, Past Lives, Spoilers for 5.3 events
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-26
Updated: 2021-02-26
Packaged: 2021-03-17 03:02:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29710659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eva_cybele/pseuds/eva_cybele
Summary: Since her return from the First, the Warrior of Light is haunted by dreams of who she used to be.Edited to add a new scene in the flashback portion, and for flow/consistency.Female Au Ra paladin WoL. Currently Aymeric/WoL, past life Emet-Selch/Azem, not even slightly Emet-Selch/WoL.
Relationships: Aymeric de Borel/Warrior of Light, Azem/Emet-Selch (Final Fantasy XIV)
Series: flew like a moth to you, sunlight [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1362601
Kudos: 18





	reflections in crystal

The orange-gold crystal glinted from among Kaede’s possessions as she rifled through her pack for a clean set of clothes to replace the travel-stained ones she’d shed the moment she’d walked into Borel Manor, and the sight stopped her cold, as if time had slowed around her. The soft glow seemed to pulse in time with her breathing as she stared into its depths, whispers tugging along the edges of her mind, teasing the Echo but not quite sending her into a full-blown flashback.

Ever since she had clutched Azem’s crystal to her breast and summoned forth souls to aid her in battle against Elidibus, it had pulled at her, as surely as it had pulled Hades – _Emet-Selch_ , she reminded herself sternly, as she watched the crystal flicker brighter at her thought of the name – from the Lifestream to break the chains of darkness that had briefly bound her.

The crystal was made to store memories, to keep them in trust for the soul that was meant to hold them, and it _yearned_ to fulfill its purpose. To imbue Kaede’s heart and mind with Azem’s thoughts, Azem’s memories, Azem’s very being. Already they shared a soul, if Kaede allowed the crystal to overwrite her mind, then… Kaede would cease to be more surely than Ardbert had, his spirit slumbering in the corner of her being.

Letting out a frustrated growl, Kaede shoved a shirt over the crystal and stood, quest for clean clothing momentarily abandoned. Instead, she busied herself with picking the meticulously plaited braids from her hair, eyes unfocused and staring inwards.

After a moment, a pair of much larger hands covered hers and guided them to drop at her sides, taking over her task with more gentleness than she had shown herself in her distraction. A deep, steadying breath brought her back to herself, enjoying the way that Aymeric’s hands quickly unraveled the blonde strands from themselves, leaving her hair to tumble down her back in loose, messy waves.

“Something bothering you?” The question was quiet, attempting for neutrality but with an undercurrent of worry.

With a sigh, Kaede leaned back against his chest, his skin still flushed with warmth in the chilly room. “It’s…complicated.” She had told him about Azem, about all her adventures in the First, in letters spirited across the void by Feo Ul, the pixie able to locate him on the front at Ghimlyt Dark even when she could not. But the crystal’s whisperings, and the dreams that followed in their wake were too strange, too alien, to spell out in something as concrete as ink on parchment, even as she sent him pressed flowers from Il Mheg or brilliantly violet leaves from the trees of Lakeland.

Long arms came around to encircle her waist, pressing her more firmly against his chest, and she could practically feel the desire to press for details vibrating under his skin. No further questions came, though, and the silence finally goaded her into action.

Gently disentangling herself from Aymeric’s arms, Kaede padded over to her pack and retrieved the crystal, trying to ignore how it warmed under the touch of her bare skin. At the tilt of her head, Aymeric seated himself on the end of his bed, and Kaede dropped gracelessly into his lap, pressing the crystal into his hand. “It’s this thing.”

With blue eyes focused into the gaze she usually saw him reserve for stubborn lords or even more stubborn paperwork, Aymeric studied the crystal, turning it over in his hands, and Kaede could swear she almost felt his long fingers ghosting over her own skin as he did so.

“This is one of the crystals you mentioned? That stores the memories of one the Ascian Convocation members.”

Kaede was too tired to try to explain the messy distinctions between _Ancient_ and _Amaurotine_ and _Ascian_ when she could barely untangle those threads in her own head, and so let the misnomer pass. “It is. Not only that but…it’s mine. Or was made for who I used to be, anyway. The last holder of the seat of Azem.” A name, a _true_ name, flickered along the edges of her thoughts, but she dared not think it with the crystal so close. It felt too much like an invitation.

Realization flared in Aymeric’s eyes, and he locked his with her own. “Aren’t these designed to uplift soul fragments to Ascian status? That sounds like a dangerous thing to keep around.”

“I don’t think it can do much without an Unsundered to wield it. I’ve used the power it contains, and I’m still me, so don’t worry _too_ much.” She smiled, trying for reassuring, but obviously fell short, judging by the mostly unabated worry in Aymeric’s expression, even as he nodded. “The thing is… it’s different from the others. Best I can tell, the crystals for the thirteen members of the Convocation who summoned Zodiark were created by Emet-Selch, but each of the Thirteen imbued their own crystal with their own thoughts. A sort of failsafe, in case one of them were to fall. _That_ one was made in secret, for the Fourteenth, after her departure. Instead of Azem’s memories of herself, it contains Emet-Selch’s memories of her, and they’re…” Kaede coughed, a dream-hazy mental image surfacing and quickly stifled, but not before a blush colored her cheeks, “biased. Very biased.”

Aymeric blinked, twice, before his eyebrows shot up and disappeared under the tousled mess of his hair. “So…in a past life, you and Emet-Selch…”

Kaede sighed and looked off to the side, willing herself not to see long silver hair haloing a handsome face and golden eyes boring into hers; to not feel squared, uncallused hands on her hips, urging her to move faster; to not hear a name gasped against her own lips –

“Yeah. Apparently. I haven’t directly accessed the crystal’s memories, but ever since it was given to me, I’ve been having…dreams. Of him. Strange thoughts that feel like mine, but also not. Feeling like there’s some part of me that’s _missing_ , somehow. It’s… unsettling. Like I needed more ghosts hanging around in my head.” Azem’s memories were briefly overwhelmed by visions of Fray, of Myste, of Ardbert, and Kaede shivered in discomfort, suddenly claustrophobic in her own skin.

A long-fingered hand, delicately tapered but hardened and scarred from a lifetime of swordsmanship, slid up her spine and into the heavy mass of blonde hair at the base of her skull, pulling her forehead to his and her body more firmly into his lap. “You’re not her, you know. She might be you, but you’re not her.”

The missing five fourteenths of her soul cried out in ache, and two words twisted in her mind: _Not yet._

“Do you know her name?” Aymeric’s voice startled her back out of her thoughts. “Azem was just a title, right? Halone knows I understand how suffocating they can be. Maybe it would help if you knew her name – she could bear the burden of being Azem without losing herself, and so can you.”

Kaede closed her eyes and shuddered. “I’m afraid if I think about it, I’ll drown.”

“I’ve seen you cut down countless enemies, stare down the dragon that threatened my city for millennia and walk toward him with blade drawn. Kaede Kazarishi does not run from her fears. Why should this be any different?” The hand at the back of her head swept down her neck, over her shoulder, and along her arm to her hand, gently turning the palm up as Azem’s crystal fell from his other hand into hers.

The words, heavy with the weight of duty, were also a lifeline. A reminder of who she was, shining in the darkness. The warmth of his body an anchor, more solid and real than the pulse of heat from the crystal in her hand.

“Her name was Persephone.”

And with that, the crystal blazed into brilliance, and the Echo swallowed her whole.

—

“How adorably provincial.”

Persephone raised her hand to her thick red hair, twisted into a heavy, intricate braid, with chains of flowers woven through. A gift from the children of the town she had recently saved from some roving bands of twisted monstrosities, escorting them to Amaurot’s still-safe walls. “I happen to like it, thank you. Keeps it out of my face. Some of us have things to do that _don’t_ involve reams of paperwork, you know.” She sniffed haughtily as she examined her nails, but a small smile curled the corners of her lips. Azem and Emet-Selch didn’t always see eye to eye on work matters, but in private, Persephone and Hades kept their discussions light, never letting the heated arguments from the Convocation chambers progress past the warmth of teasing.

Hades leaned forward on her couch, setting his mask aside so she could see the way his eyes crinkled fondly as he looked at her. “I didn’t say I didn’t like it, my dear. And I’m sure it has its benefits.” His hand reached up and plucked one of the largest blossoms – a rose – from the center of the braid. “But it would look better loose. Spread out against the cushions, perhaps?”

Nose wrinkling in mock irritation, Persephone snatched the flower back out of his hand and _reached_ with her magic, the concept of a vase, filled with water, materializing in her mind and then her hand. Ignoring his blatant invitation, she settled the bright pink bloom in the vase and surrounded it with its brethren, arranging them in a pleasing manner before settling the vase onto a nearby table.

“Such care given to lives already mostly spent.” Persephone glanced back at the change in his tone, the way his mouth twisted down, eyes seeing the flower’s imminent death, but not its ephemeral beauty. Such was his way, to plumb the depths but be blind to the surface.

Perhaps work would follow them home this time after all.

“Just because they will die doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be cherished and protected.” The disaster facing the rest of the world was closing in on Amaurot, and still her fellows debated, with ideas ranging from inaction to measures so drastic that Persephone reflexively turned her mind away. Only when there had been no place left for the Traveler to travel had she returned to her home, finding it far too much as she had left it, even while beyond its border, chaos reigned.

At the shift in her voice from warm to chilly and firm, Hades dragged a hand down his face, suddenly looking more tired than she had ever seen him. “My apologies, my dear. I didn’t intend to discuss that here.” He stood and drifted over to her, wrapping his arms around her stomach and resting his cheek on the top of her head. “I’m glad you’re home. I’ve missed you terribly.”

One of her hands rose and slid against his cheek, a silent forgiveness of his misstep, as well as request for him to excuse her response. They were all stressed, and she wasn’t about to let her only moment of peace be spoiled before the Convocation reconvened at dawn’s light tomorrow morning. Azem would handle tomorrow when it came, Persephone was determined to wring out the last drops of love and light that she could find from her life before then.

“I’m glad to _be_ home, dearest. What was it you were saying before? About wanting to see my hair all spread out on the cushions?” She quirked an eyebrow at him, relieved to see his gaze sharpen and fixate on her, his arms tightening around her.

Turning, she pressed her mouth to his, and with a thought, their robes disintegrated and left her warm, sun-kissed skin sliding against pale flesh that few had ever seen unclad in voluminous fabric. He didn’t seem surprised by her trick – it was a favorite of hers – as his fingertips dug into her firm backside and lifted her effortlessly into the air, her legs twining around his waist as he carried her to the couch. The tie used to secure her braid disappeared, and a sudden, strange breeze carded through her hair as he lowered her to the cushions, the wind stroking her scalp and fanning the red curls around her face.

Kneeling over her, he hesitated at her entrance, and Persephone rolled her hips to meet his with a fond smile. “You always did have a way of getting exactly what you want.” A silver silken curtain separated her from the rest of the world as his hair fell around them, and all she could see was his smug grin and adoring golden eyes as he slowly sank into her, inch by glorious inch.

“You speak as if that is a failing of mine, my dear.” Sheathed fully inside, Hades held himself very still, savoring the moment, if his bliss-closed eyes were any indication.

Persephone laughed, a little breathless, and sparked with pride at the way it made him involuntarily twitch his hips. “Selfishness is not an Amaurotine virtue, Hades.” Slowly, sinuously, she wove her arms around his neck and brought his mouth to hers – as she pushed off the back of the couch and rolled them both roughly to the floor. He let out a gasp as his back hit the carpet, followed by a moan as the momentum that had briefly pulled him out of her brought them flush back together.

The impact sent shockwaves through Persephone too, but she just smirked down at him through the pleasant ache, settling herself more comfortably on her knees above him. Blunt, square fingers dug almost painfully into the soft flesh of her hips as Hades took a great shuddering breath beneath her. “You are one to talk about _virtue_ –” The mock irritation in his voice strangled and died as she rolled her hips again, setting up a slow, deep rhythm.

“I’m sorry, were you saying something? Please, do go on.” Amusement wove its way through her voice as she kept on, enjoying the way that Hades’s normally-oh-so-clever tongue had gone dumb and senseless at her touch. Instead of a voiced response, she was met with a sudden jerk of his hips that knocked her momentarily breathless.

Laughing aloud, Persephone bent to press a kiss against his mouth, and the only further words spoken that night were each other’s names.

—

A flash, like the Echo receding, and then –

—

The Capitol building rattled beneath the strength of the bombardment of meteors from the heavens, even that greatest of buildings not unshakeable in the presence of what threatened to spell the end for their world. In the week she had been back in Amaurot, the calamity some were calling the End of Days had reached the star’s final bastion, and her city crumbled beneath the stress more quickly than any other she’d seen.

The village with the children who had woven flowers through her hair was probably gone now, scorched from the earth if not by meteors, than by the fear-born horrors created from the minds of her own people.

A week, and still the Convocation deliberated, one by one agreeing with Lahabrea’s mad plan.

Loghrif and Mitron had been the final undecided votes, and finally, Mitron spread her hands and sighed. “I can see no other way than this. We must stop this at any cost, and no other plan has a great enough probability of success. The price is great, but come what may, we must not surrender to despair. If we but hold fast to hope, we may yet find a path to salvation.”

Loghrif, seated as always to Mitron’s left, their hands entwined, inclined her head. “The seats of Loghrif and Mitron assent to Speaker Lahabrea’s plan to rewrite the laws of the star.”

Azem felt her heart sink as thirteen masked faces turned to her expectantly. The gaze directly across the table from her own felt the most piercing of all, as she could practically feel Emet-Selch pleading with her to see reason. His voice remained impassive, however. “And what of the seat of Azem? Do you still dissent?”

“I do.” The finality of her voice echoed in the hall, and Lahabrea all but snarled in frustration.

“Do you not see that your pointless objections do _nothing_ but cause more destruction and death? Azem, we _must_ do what needs to be done! You have given us no plans, no concrete steps to take, _nothing–”_

_“I gave you months!”_ Her voice, normally calm and measured, rang out in fury. “Months of reports, of observations, of _warnings_ , as this calamity swallowed the world, and you all did _nothing_ , until it was _on our doorstep!_ Months of pleading with you to grant me the resources to study the cause, to intervene and attempt to prevent countless deaths, and still you remained stagnant within the walls of Amaurot, unable to look beyond your own lives! And now, when pressed, you would surrender the fate of this star and the lives of half our people to some construct whose power you cannot _possibly_ predict or control or understand. I cannot condone it. You would turn Amaurot into a slaughterhouse, and the survivors into slaves. How will you choose those who are to die? Will you Thirteen be among those to be chosen, or will you hold yourselves above? What of your families? Your friends? Your lovers?” Azem scanned the room, not realizing she had stood and brought herself to her full fifteen fulms of height, and none save Lahabrea, Elidibus, and Emet-Selch would meet her furious gaze.

Elidibus held up a hand, the small man’s deep voice echoing in the chamber. “Azem, please. Calm yourself. We will see that what must be done is carried out fairly, of that I assure you. We _Fourteen_ ,” – and the stress in his voice made it clear he wanted her included in their number – “must remain to ensure that the concept takes its proper form, but no other exceptions shall be made, save that those who give their lives in service to Amaurot will do so willingly. We will not force anyone. Please, my friend, you must see reason.”

Azem felt the anger drain from her, replaced by exhaustion. Elidibus was her counterpart – the Traveler was meant to learn of other peoples, to initiate peaceful exchange, while the Emissary was sent to extend the olive branch of peace to those who bore Amaurot ill will. The two of them were the buffer between Amaurot and the outside world, but no one had threatened their city’s peace in lifetimes. The Emissary became a relic, a title given to the young and gifted as an honor, but with no true responsibility. Until now. And if even the Emissary refused to look outside their borders for the solution to their problems, then…

They were all lost.

“If the Convocation is set on this course of action, I can see no recourse left to me. The seat of Azem withdraws from the Convocation.” At least then she could get out of this damned chamber and _do_ something, if they would not.

Protests rang out in all directions, those she once called her fellows standing and yelling over each other, but Azem kept her eyes fixed on the three seated figures opposite her. Elidibus bent his head in sorrow, but said nothing. Lahabrea shouted for everyone to quiet down, but she did not miss the way his mouth had curled up in triumph. And Emet-Selch remained very still, his hands clasped so tight the bones must be grinding together, still staring at her.

Taking a deep, steadying breath, Azem gathered her strength around her like a cloak and turned, striding from the room without another word.

There were preparations to make, allies to summon, she would have to speak to Hythlodaeus and have him acquire a few things for her, the journey to the place where the Sound had first been heard was dangerous beyond words –

“Will you not stay?” The ache in Emet-Selch’s voice made Azem hesitate, slow her steps as they carried her out of the Capitol.

“You know I cannot. This plan - it is _monstrous_. There is another way to save our star. There _must_ be.” Sacrificing thousands to call forth a being with enough power to literally rewrite the laws of nature – it was unthinkable. The price was too much to bear, when still they did not even know the source of what sought to undo the world.

“Then leave the Convocation if you must but please, I need to know that you are safe, and I cannot do that if you leave the city. Cast aside the position of Azem. Stay where it is safe and then you can hate me when this is over but I beg of you, do not go out there alone. Persephone, _please._ ” So much fear in his voice, so much anguish, and it cut Azem to the core of her being to hear him so broken, but it did not change her resolve. Not even when she looked back to see his mask in his hands, his eyes looking as deeply into her soul as they ever had.

She lifted her hand and lowered her own mask, looking at him bare-faced for one final time. “…Selfishness is not an Amaurotine virtue, Hades.”

She watched his face crumple in pain as she put her mask back into place. She would have rather remembered his face as she had last seen it, warm and relaxed and full of love, but their crumbling world saw fit to deny her that final comfort as well.

“I am Azem, and I will do my duty. Even as you all abandon yours in favor of this abomination, I will continue. Goodbye, Emet-Selch.” It broke Persephone’s heart to speak the words, but Azem stood firm.

At the invocation of his title, Hades jerked as if struck – never had she addressed him thus when his face and heart were bared to her, and she watched his mouth twist in anger as he also replaced his mask, pulling himself up to his full height.

“Go then. May you find what you seek. Perhaps in your misbegotten idealism you will save us all, but I doubt it.” His robe flared out around him as he spun on his heel and stalked back into the Convocation chambers, to prepare for the creation of their new god.

A whisper reached her soul as she stepped out into the hellish landscape that had once been Amaurot.

_Remember us._

_—_

Finally, finally, thoughts and sensations began to penetrate the shroud of memory that lay thick over her mind. The soft plush blanket against her legs. The sticky discomfort of sweat and body heat that comes from bare flesh being pressed together for too long. Long fingers carding through her hair, smoothing the tangles left over from her braids.

It took a moment to remember that her hair was blonde, rather than dark red, freed from plaits that paid homage to a lost friend rather than adorned with flowers on the whims of children, and that the man curled around her much smaller form was nothing like the one from her dreams.

Kaede let out a deep breath she didn’t realize she’d been holding, and Aymeric’s arms tightened around her back. “Back with me?”

Not yet trusting her voice, Kaede nodded. The crystal pressed indentions into her hand where she clutched it, but it no longer pulsed with heat. The urge to surrender herself to memory had subsided, docile and sleeping curled tightly in the corner of her mind, Persephone’s presence less alien and more comfortable now that she had seen her, named her, _accepted_ her.

“How do you feel?” Aymeric’s fingers traced delicately up the scales along her spine, anchoring her in her own body, small and scaled and strange against Persephone’s immense size and perfection.

“Like myself. Just…tired.” The sadness that swelled and briefly threatened to overwhelm her was her own, she thought. Her last remaining shred of hatred for Emet-Selch had softened to pity, a grace she could freely grant him now that his threat to the world had been ended.

With arms grown heavy in exhaustion – Echo visions often left her feeling tired, but this one was worse than most – Kaede pushed herself back from Aymeric’s chest, sitting upright in his bed before rather woodenly making her way to her pack to drop the crystal inside. At some point he had moved them to lay under the covers rather than be a seated tangle at the foot of the bed, and she was glad of his foresight. She felt bad enough without a rogue muscle cramp or something. The bed stirred beneath her after she sat back down, and lips pressed against her bare shoulder. “Did you want to talk about it?”

Frowning, Kaede turned the idea over in her mind. “Not right now, I think. It feels too…intimate. What I saw. Like I’d be telling someone else’s story. The memories felt like mine, but also...not. Instead of seeing what Emet-Selch put into the crystal, I think it just triggered the Echo to show me things from Persephone's perspective. Not much different than a normal Echo vision, but stronger.” Kaede shook her head as the words began to spill out despite herself. “It was sad. Impossibly sad. But I don’t think she regretted her choices, even as they took her far away from her home and the people she loved. She trusted Emet-Selch to protect their home in his own way, as she did in hers. She couldn’t forgive the choice he made at the end, but she understood him, and why he might make it.” Shoving a hand into her hair, she sighed heavily. “I’m not making any sense, am I.”

A melancholy chuckle vibrated against her skin. “It sounds familiar, honestly.”

A wandering hero responsible for the entire world, a prince grounded in his city… Maybe he had a point. Twisting in his arms, Kaede pressed a kiss against his mouth. “You have never been so narrow-minded as he was. Ishgard may be your first priority, but I know you wouldn’t let the rest of the world burn around you to protect it. Plus, you’re prettier.”

That startled a snort-laugh out of Aymeric, and he tugged her back down into the blankets. “I’m glad you’re feeling better.”

“Yes, well, I guess you might have some good ideas sometimes. Don’t let it go to your head.” A smile played around Kaede’s mouth as she rested her chin on her arms, leaving her feeling lighter than she had in weeks.

“I’ll do my best.” He flashed her a grin, which quickly softened into a wistful smile. “Can you stay a while? You need some rest, and I hear there’s been some good progress made on restoring the Firmament…I thought perhaps tomorrow we could go tour it, you could show me around, since you know it better than I do, now.”

Stretching her entire body into one taut line, from outstretched hands to toes to tail-tip, Kaede settled more comfortably into Aymeric’s bed, exhaustion tugging at her mind. “I think, now that the Scions are all back and recovering, that I can _finally_ take a small break. And I would love nothing more than to spend it with you.”

Sleep pulled her into its embrace soon after, and for the first time since she left the First with her bag filled with soul crystals, she dreamt of nothing in particular.

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so technically Aymeric doesn't come back to Ishgard until 5.4 but damn Square, let me rest okay? I just want to be able to take a vacation before the world starts going to shit again. So very very slightly AU I guess.


End file.
